fixative

Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

n. Something that fixes, protects, or preserves, especially:

n. A liquid preservative applied to artwork, such as watercolor paintings or charcoal drawings.

n. A solution used to preserve and harden fresh tissue for microscopic examination.

n. A liquid mixed with perfume to prevent rapid evaporation.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

n. A substance that fixes, protects, or preserves.

adj. Serving to fix or bind.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English

n. That which serves to set or fix colors or drawings, as a mordant.

from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

Serving to fix, or make fixed or stable: as, a fixative substance or process.

n. Anything which serves to render fixed or stable, as a mordant with reference to colors; specifically, a weak solution of shellac in alcohol applied to charcoal and crayon drawings with an atomizer to fix them and prevent them from being rubbed.

n. In perfumery, a substance used to detain from too speedy evaporation a highly volatile ingredient of agreeable odor. The substance so used may itself be inodorous or may contribute to the blended odor of the mixed perfume.

Etymologies

Examples

That said, there are certain things that families can do to mitigate the potential downside of vaccinations and one thing is to request of their pediatricians that the MMR vaccination be given without thimersol as the fixative, which is a mercury-based fixative.